"Streets of London"

 

Just look a the size of that punched card!

It must be a good eighteen inches wide. Fancy carting thirty of these tunes around when you go out playing.

This young lady was not playing in London, but in Italy and the instrument appears to be a 'Piano Melodia'....in the shape of a miniature 'Baby Grand'.

On the subject of 'Street Pianos' I have just read that there is to be a three week experiment backed by Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, and by the national lottery, plonking 31 pianos around the capital to encourage people to gather for a singsong with strangers.

They will be placed at prominent sites such as the British Library, the Natural History Museum, the Bank of England and Tate Britain.

Each will be decorated by an artist with an appropriate motif – the one outside the Bank will be painted with money, one on Carnaby Street will be adorned with bright 1960s-style swirls and one in Portobello Road market will feature fruit and veg.

A full-time tuner will tour the sites on a bicycle to maintain them. (Missed out there Deb?)

Although the pianos will be chained to bollards and railings, members of the public will be trusted not to vandalise the instruments or steal the laminated songbooks.

I wonder what will happen when 'elf 'n safety, or the performing rights bunch get wind of this?

It will probably take them three weeks to find out which rules have been broken..... and by then the pianos have been moved.